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Toghrul Narimanbeyov: â€œI will go to Shusha not as a guest, but as a hostâ€ â€“ INTERVIEW-PHOTOSESSION

Toghrul Narimanbeyov: â€œI will go to Shusha not as a guest, but as a hostâ€ â€“ <font color=red>INTERVIEW-PHOTOSESSION</font>

06 July 2009 09:03 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Ulkar Gasimova â€“APA. USSR and Azerbaijan peopleâ€™s artist, world-known Azerbaijani artist living in France Toghrul Narimanbeyov gives an interview to APA

- Toghrul, you are spending much time abroad. Do you long for Azerbaijan?

-Yes. I spend much time abroad. It is impossible not to miss Azerbaijan. Yes, I miss. You know, Azerbaijan is a country with a strong aura. It is a country of oil and its nature inspires the artist. I would like to note Baku particularly, because this city helps to feel both colors and rhythms. Most of our artists feel that. I am living abroad and traveling widely. Therefore I better feel this difference. I feel great enthusiasm and creative force in Baku. My homeland inspires me.

- Probably you know current situation of the Azerbaijan art school.

-There is a recession in the world art, particularly in the visual art. It occurs because many people lost their national traditions. We canâ€™t forget our past. We have to make development on the basis of our past.

- Do you satisfy with the works of young artists?

- It is important for the young artists to feel own creative course. Our youth, for example young jazzmen repeat everything coming from the West. It is important to save individualism and national coloring. The art of miniature has own spirit and it is a great philosophy like poems of Nizami and Fuzuli. It is characteristic for the Oriental peoples. We need to understand the nationality just from this point of view. I am regretful that the youth is following the order of the day. The young artists have highest color feelings, but they repeat the abstractionism. The abstractionism is a high-level art. Only decent artists have to take this way. There is an abstraction in any figurative art. Everything loses its value when it is repeated.

-Are there your followers among the young artists?

-There are young artists who try to repeat my style, but they have to work hard. My style is very complicated because it is based on the opening the life, progress and nature and it is difficult to understand it at once. It unites the achievements of the world art. I create such works that when I present it in the West among the abstractionists their works seem pale as against my works. I have an ability to see abstracts. It is the most important peculiarity for the artist. I saw in the European academies that the education there is not based on the learning of traditions, which makes the artist independent. I consider that it is not an independence, but emptiness. The art has own rules and it is impossible to avoid these rules. It needs to develop it. The artist has to discover something on his way, but has not to expect discoveries from others.

- Where are you teaching now?

-I am not teaching now because I have many ideas and I intend to realize them today. But it is interesting to be a teacher. The art has to be in the blood and in the heart of the artist. The art can not be created forcibly or depending on other factors.

-Can you reveal your ideas and plans, if it is not secret?

-Yes, of course. I lived in Samarkand for some time and I collected there many materials about Timur. I am looking forward to carry out some project about him. We traveled throughout Absheron together with Sattar Bahlulzadeh and Rasim Babayev. I have many studies about that and Timur as well and I will turn these studies into the art works and I intend to realize it soon. I am looking forward to create historic work about Timurâ€™s epoch.

-Will you organize your exhibition in Baku in near future?

-I have new works and I didnâ€™t show them yet. I will organize exhibition of these works in more comfortable and easy time. I have series of works in Paris dedicated to Azerbaijan and Absheron. I will exhibit these works in Baku at one time. I would like to realize this idea within a year.

-Do you think to open your gallery in Paris or Baku?

- May be. Why not? I may open a gallery in Paris. If I open my personal gallery in Baku, I will do that in Icherisheher (Old City). I have depicted Icherisheher since age of 15. I climbed to the roofs and painted my works of Icherisheher. I always show all charms of Icherisheher and I am following it until now. I created multiple works about Azerbaijan and Icherisheher and it will be always so.

- You are from Shushaâ€¦ Do you think to travel to Shusha?

- Sure. Shusha is a wonder, our wonder. It is impossible to forget Shusha and not to miss its beautiful nature. In that time I always traveled to Shusha at the earliest opportunity and was inspired by the beautifulness of Shusha. I am sure that the justice will be restored and we will get back our lands. The world community well knows whose is Karabakh and the lands should be returned to their owner. My grandfather and father were from Shusha. My father moved to Germany for his business. He got education in Toulouse, France and then returned to Azerbaijan as an engineer. He participated in the construction of Mingachevir hydropower station. My father was a victim of repression in 1937.

- A group of Azerbaijani intellectuals visited Nagorno Karabakh. If you received invitation to visit Nagorno Karabakh, Shusha, would you accept it?

- No. I would never visit Shusha as a guest and I will go to Shusha as a host. Such visits mean that they are hosting us as visitors. It is our land. Shusha is ours. We have to say it to all over the world. I donâ€™t receive invitation to visit Shusha. Mey be they donâ€™t invite me because I am living abroad. Shusha is ours and we have to own our land. If Shusha is returned I will live there. I donâ€™t see more beauty city than Shushaâ€¦